Search the Collection

Sir William Boxall (1800-1879), Painter and Director of the National Gallery

Sitter in 7 portraitsArtist associated with 18 portraitsThe son of an Oxford taxation official, William Boxall entered the Royal Academy schools in 1819. He worked in London between 1823 and 1833, chiefly as a portrait painter but occasionally exhibiting history and subject pictures in an attempt to gain recognition. Between the mid-1830s and the 1860s he enjoyed a reputation as a society painter and also for his likenesses of leading literary, artistic and intellectual figures of the day. To further his ambition to succeed as a history painter he travelled and studied in Italy (1833-6), but portraiture remained his principal employment, accounting for most of his exhibited works. Boxall was elected ARA in 1851 and RA in 1863.